What an exciting postseason run for a group of girls from El Paso, Gridley and that area. The EPG Titans set a new mark for wins in a season while capturing the program’s first state trophy.

El Paso-Gridley defeated Walther Lutheran of Melrose Park 55-46 for third place in the Class 2A girls’ basketball state finals Saturday night. It capped an exceptional season.

“In the summer, we were talking about getting to Redbird and somebody said ‘Let’s dream big’ and it stuck from there,” Chelsea Kessinger, El Paso-Gridley senior basketball player, said last weekend at the IHSA Class 2A state tournament. “When we got here it was like, wow, we actually accomplished our dream. No matter what happened, we got to Redbird.”

The victory for the Titans completed a busy week that saw them deal with a snowstorm on the ride to the supersectional at Monmouth. A win over Byron that night put EPG into the state finals, but the task at hand was monumental, a battle against top-ranked and towering St. Thomas More.

“It wasn’t easy but the ride was worth it,” EPG head coach Kyle Bobbitt said of the season.

The Titans lost twice in 32 games, finishing 30-2. The first was to Rochester, a 3A school, at the State Farm Classic over Christmas. The next was to St. Thomas More in the state semifinals.

“St. Thomas More was a tough loss for us, but we knew we had to get back up and play our last game like it’s our last game because it is our last game,” Schlipf said.

But EPG bounced back one more time. It showed a lot of character in a group of girls who consider themselves as a family unit.

“This is a very resilient bunch,” Bobbitt said at a press conference after the third-place game. “I tell them 80 percent of the game is mental, 20 percent is physical. I told them at the beginning of the season it’s not about physical.

“Physically, I feel we can play with anybody because our girls play extremely hard. It’s how we carry the load that matters. They are able to move to the next play and not let a run hurt them. We’ve done it all season, to be able to bounce back.”

There was an attitude with this team, by far the best small-school girls’ team I’ve covered since getting into this business 30 years ago.

Page 2 of 2 - A major factor in this team’s cohesiveness is the way the seniors were able to accept the situation.

“I couldn’t ask for a better end,” said senior Jenna Souhrada at the press conference. “We started together and we ended together. I couldn’t ask for any better place to do it than Redbird Arena in the state finals.”

Kessinger added, “It was an amazing feeling. We’ve played basketball since we were little, since bitty ball, altogether. It was great to end our career on the floor together. It was an awesome feeling.”

The four seniors on the EPG team were Kessinger, Souhrada, Mattie Buchanan and Darian DeVary. Besides being talented players, these young ladies showed what being team leaders and teammates are all about.

One of the biggest factors in creating disharmony on a team is having the seniors not accept underclassmen as key players.

These four did, and in a big way. It was easy because they have been playing together for such a long time. But that doesn’t always work out.

EPG’s seniors may not have even realized it, but they were part of the program as underclassmen and that may have shown through in respecting this year’s bunch.

The two best players on the team were juniors. Rebekah Ehresman and Codee Schlipf have been the two best, or at least two of the top three, players on the team since they were freshmen.

They lead by example, but it was the inspiration brought on by players like Kessinger, Souhrada, Buchanan and DeVary that made this team a family, as they called themselves.

“It’s kind of bittersweet because it’s the last game with the seniors,” Ehresman said after Saturday’s contest. “We’re sad about that but we couldn’t have ended it any better way.”

By accepting everyone as equals, the EPG girls were able to make their big dream come true.

Just remember juniors; you will be the seniors next year. Take what you have learned about respecting your teammates and put that into practice next year. With a little luck, you may be back playing on Doug Collins Court one more time.